


We Are the Only Gods

by ChocolateWhore, Kyle_Rose_137



Category: Death Note (Anime & Manga)
Genre: Amnesia, Amnesia AU, Explosions, I'm Bad At Tagging, M/M, Matt's all alone now
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-04-09
Updated: 2018-04-09
Packaged: 2019-04-20 20:58:18
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,691
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14269392
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ChocolateWhore/pseuds/ChocolateWhore, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kyle_Rose_137/pseuds/Kyle_Rose_137
Summary: Mail Jeevas and Mihael Keehl, the infamous duo of thugs and mafia rebels in the LA area, widely known by the alias as M2. The two are highly dangerous and like to run it big. With Mello's carefully executed plans and Matt's brilliant hacking skills, they're living the high life. However, what would happen if one of these plans went up in smoke, leaving the redheaded hacker on his own?After an explosion, Matt packs his things and leaves the apartment behind, but now a new hacker has taken over, a hacker going by the alias 'Ghost' and a new mafia syndicate, one far more dangerous than what Mello once ran. But the new leader is a Russian himself. Matt still has hope of seeing his friend again, and he thinks reaching out to this mafia might offer him just what he was looking for. But is it worth the risk?





	1. Cross to Bear

**November 11, 2007**

**8:38 p.m**

      He'd seen it before. That same damn rosary with the red beads. He'd seen it in various conditions. He'd seen it scuffed, cracked, bloody, broken and muddy. Never before had he seen it, or imagined to see it burnt and half melted into the hand of a corpse, charred beyond recognition. His amber eyes stared down at those red and silver beads and at first, he was reluctant to believe it. It couldn't be the same rosary. If that rosary was the same that his leather clad friend always wore, then that mean that the corpse was in fact the blond. Matt refused to believe it. He couldn't believe that Mello, his Mello, was gone. He was too smart for that. Too smart to let himself get caught in that blast. Even if there was no other choice, he would've had a backup plan. One that enabled his ability to survive and would have worked his way around any other possible obstacle.

 

       Yet there it was, the proof staring right back up at him. That red rosary and engraved on the back of the cross was Mello's signature Gothic M. It was his, and that charred, lifeless body no doubt belonged to him. But Matt still did not believe it. There was no way that Matt was letting himself think that Mello was dead. Mello, his best friend, his only friend. The only person he loved, trusted and cared about. To think - no, to believe - that the strongest person Matt had known was dead, he couldn't fathom it. The redheaded hacker had always lived in a world of video games of endless respawning and cheats. Even now he knew, however, that there would be no coming back from this. Mello would not come back. Dammit, no, you idiot. Mello isn't dead. He's stronger than this. Matt was still clinging to hope. He refused to fully believe what he had seen. Clinging to the hope that his blond friend would return, he carefully picked the rosary from the corpse, draping it around his own neck as he thumbed over the M on the back. “Sorry, Mells,” he found himself mumbling as he stared down at the body. “....I'm sorry.”

 

* * *

 

 

**November 12-21, 2007**

      The next several days were spent hopelessly searching in vain for his friend. Even over those few days, Matt was still adamant that Mello was alive. That trigger happy blond had sources and connections like no other; he would have found someone. Someone capable enough to help him. He would have dragged himself to some underground help, dug himself back from Hell if that's what it took. Despite knowing this, Matt was coming up dry, no matter where he searched. Finding the blond should've been easy. If Mello were alive, there was no doubt in the hacker's mind that he would have contacted him at some point. After all, what was the leader of a mafia without his most trusted hacker? 

      That's when he made his mind up - he was leaving. Within that week, he'd packed his belongings and left his - their - apartment behind. With him, he took his own 9mm Beretta, one of the set of twin stainless steel Berettas Mello had obtained at some point. He'd opted for the twin Berettas while Matt had gotten the odd one out. He'd also taken his hacking equipment and whatever Mello had kept of his at the apartment. No, the redhead had no intention joining another syndicate as a job. Side jobs, he would do, but the syndicate that Mello belonged to was the only one that Matt had ever been involved in, and he was beyond reluctant to join another. As far as the redhead was concerned, he was better off alone than with anyone that wasn't Mello. Working with the blond always worked out well; he always  _ had  _ done Mello's bidding. There was no one else that Matt could find himself able to work with. Whether it was out of reluctance or fear, he didn't know. Sure, hack jobs he'd still do, but never had he considered joining another organization. It didn't matter what logic or dreams he was running off of, Matt was waiting for Mello to come back, or at least contact him.  It didn't happen.

 

* * *

 

 

**June 3, 2008**

**11:23 p.m**

       Matt sat on the floor in his apartment, a circle of laptops surrounding him. Each screen had something different pulled up; hack jobs, video games, and dead end searches. He figured his best plan of action was to dig up information, causing him to be sitting in a hunched position, cross legged as he leaned over the keyboard of one of the laptops. His orange tinted goggles were strung around his neck with the rosary, a cigarette hanging lazily from his lips as lethargic amber eyes looked over the two monitors that sat side by side. Matt was entirely alone, as he had been for several months. The only contact he really ever had was occasionally going to the store and buying enough ramen to last a while to avoid having to leave the apartment. The only ones he kept in contact with were the voices that floated through the headphones that were rested over his messy red hair, a microphone hanging out from before his lips. Before the explosion, Matt was an avid gamer. It was an easy way to help him forget about his insomnia, despite how badly it annoyed Mello. However, since the blond disappeared, the redheaded gamer hadn’t been able to so much as touch a game console. “It’s been six months, Matt,” a concerned voice from the headset jerked him from his thoughts. The multiplayer game he had pulled up one one of the other screens was long abandoned, pulled up solely for the fact of keeping in contact with an old friend of his from the orphanage he’d been raised at. “You need to move on. I know it’s hard, but you’re falling apart. You and I both know Mello wouldn’t want this. He’d be pissed to see you like this.”

       “Shut up, Linda,” Matt snapped into the microphone, running his thumb back over the cross charm of the rosary. The redhead clenched his teeth and glared at the screen before him. Another dead end. Not that he’d expected any different. No, he’d grown used to them, and it wasn’t a stretch to say that he expected them. “I know he would be, trust me. But what does that matter? If he’s alive, he’s abandoned me. I think my being pissed is fully justified,” he growled into the speaker.

       “Matt-”

       “Don’t say it. I know where this is going, and what you’re going to say. Don’t fucking say it.”

       Linda had been like a mother to Matt, or more of a mother figure. Even though the two had been very young when Matt even left the orphanage, he still had looked up to her. She was the only girl in his life that he'd clung onto, and tried desperately to keep in contact with her after running away. However, when he came across the leather clad megalomaniac with a bullet hole in his shoulder, all contact with Linda had been dropped. He hated to think of what she'd say if she found out how he'd taken on an unforgivable life of crime. How many had died because of him? Because of both of them?

       Of course, Linda was smart. She knew how Matt read binary like English and how his fingers could run across the keys of a laptop without even looking. When the hacker by the alias M2 appeared in the Los Angeles area, appearing to belong to the largest syndicate there, Matt had been contacted by her right away. The redhead had figured that she'd find out, eventually. Unfortunately, he'd had to face her wrath for not telling her, himself, and instead trying to run from it. The two weren't nearly as close as they had been, however, but that didn't seem to bother either of them. It never changed the way Linda talked to or acted around him. Including that night, while Matt still grieved, silently while clutching that cross in his fingers. She didn't remain silent, then, either, and that was the first time Matt every truly resented her and her logic. “Matt, I've heard you talk about Mello so much. He wouldn't have taken a bullet for you to save your ass if he ever had intentions of leaving you behind. If he were alive, he would have found you,” Linda mentioned, sharply. 

       “Shut up,” he growled, reaching out and slamming his laptop shut. He didn't want to believe that Mello was dead, but he knew Linda was right. She was smart, he knew that. 

       That was the night he took the rosary off for the first time. He hung it up over a nail in the wall where it could hide in the shadows, and then he just walked away.

 


	2. Russian Hell

**October 7, 2008**

**11:10 p.m**

The redhead sat alone in his apartment, as usual. The room was illuminated dimly by flashes of pictures coming from the TV. It was a habit of his to have it on as background noise, though rarely did he pay attention to it. The only news stories he deemed worth listening in on were of a hacker that was given the name ‘Ghost Hacker.’ It was a pretty dumb and lazy name that rubbed him the wrong way, seeing as it was now his name. The Ghost Hacker - the most dangerous hacker in LA that could and  _ would  _ hack any system. Didn't matter whose life he was ruining, nor who he was stealing from. He'd do anything for money as long as it could be done from behind a screen, and that's just what he did. 

Sighing with a stream of smoke curling up from his lips, the hacker leaned with his back pressed against the sofa. As usual, he was surrounded by laptops on the floor, a cigarette in his lips. The job he was working on was nearly done and all that was left to do was wait for the files to download. While the redhead waited, he took to playing some game on his PSP in the darkness of the small room. The apartment, itself, was rather small, and was made to seem even smaller due to his lack of ability to organize things. There were empty beer bottle, cans of soda, dirty plates and chip bags strewn across the room, not to mention the overflowing ashtrays. Stale smoke still lingered in the room, the fire alarms disarmed for his room for obvious reasons. There was no specific rule  _ against  _ disabling the smoke detectors, that's how he saw it, at least. He knew Mello would've had a fit if he were there; he always hated the messes that Matt left lying around, not that he was much of a neat-freak, himself. The one time he had pointed this out, the trigger happy Russian had a gun to his head within a few seconds, telling him where he was allowed to put his opinion. Matt had simply met his cold gaze, lifted a cigarette to his mouth and lit it. The hacker didn't care much about Mello's threats. He knew the blond cared about him too much to pull the trigger. Linda had been right, why else would Mello have taken a bullet for him that time? Not that it mattered to Matt, anymore. He'd given up on the blond ever returning. Mello hadn't been a Robin Hood by any means at all, but he certainly didn't deserve the fate he'd been handed: burning to death in a chain of bombs that Matt had created. The hacker had realized directly after the explosion that he was at fault. He'd created those bombs and in the end, they'd gotten Mello killed.

He hated knowing that, knowing that ultimately, Mello's death was his fault. Then again, there was still some hope he had, though knowing it had to be entirely worthless. Taking another drag from his cigarette, the redhead snuffed it out on the floor beside him and flicked it away at random, not even taking his eyes off the game in his hands. The news anchor on the TV droned on in the back, but he was only half listening. The next segment came up, something about some big drug company being busted, but whoever caught them, basically stole whatever shit they had or something like that. Matt wasn't paying attention. That is, until the screen showed a black van that had been spray painted with large, red Russian characters. 

**мы единственные боги**

_ We are the only Gods. _

Matt's handheld game clattered to the floor as he stared at the screen, his amber eyes wide. That phrase was all too familiar...it was something he'd always said.  _ We are the only Gods.  _ How could this person have known? Did someone survive the explosion? Maybe there was someone who Mello had known...there was that one ex-mafioso that the blond had mentioned once or twice… 

_ Gods don't destroy. At best, we're devils.  _

That was always Mello's reply when Matt spoke his mind. A conversation that only Mello knew. And characters that Mello knew, seeing as he was still fluent in the Russian language. The phrase that Mello knew and the language, it couldn't have been a coincidence, right? But Mello was dead; it had been nearly a year and Matt had given up so long ago. As stupid as it sounded, Matt was irritated that this person, whoever they were, was feeding him false hope. 

Mihael Keehl was dead and gone, but this person was bringing him back.

 

* * *

 

 

**October 19, 2008**

**10:06 p.m**

The hacker had been staying holed up in his apartment more than usual, keeping an eye on any activity involving the newest mafia syndicate in LA, that had become the biggest and most dangerous organization seemingly overnight. It had quickly become more active within the last couple of days, leaving behind the same, red tag with the same Russian translation. Matt had to admit it, though. He was fairly amused. For such a widely known syndicate, so large in such a short amount of time, the leader had to be a complete and utter dumbass. Smirking to himself, he shook his head and lifted a cigarette to his lips. Did he  _ want  _ them to get caught? This idiot mafia boss was leaving behind a bright red, fucking flag behind, wherever they went. It was as if he assumed the police would never catch onto them and bring them in. Either he was a complete egomaniac or, as Matt preferred to think, he was a complete idiot.

He hated to think that this idiot of a mafia leader reminded him so much of Mello, who was the smartest person Matt had ever met. For someone as dumb as this guy to be able to remind him of the blond...it irritated him to no end. His sole reason for being reminded of Mello was simply because of how dangerous they made him to be, and because of the Russian tags he left behind. Was that it? If that was the case, Matt was beyond angry with himself. Plenty of people knew Russian, and how hard was it to look something as simple as a phrase up online and translate it? Anyone could do that. But that particular phrase...the only one who knew it was Mello. No one else could have known it. Whoever it was, they had to have been connected to the mafia that the Russian was from, Matt knew that much. 

Smoke escaping his lips, the hacker sighed and looked back at the screen of his laptop. Another raid had gone down, apparently wiping the financial contents of a bank entirely dry. Despite what the redhead had originally thought, the new boss certainly had an eye for hacker. Maybe none as good as him, but this one was skilled enough to override a banks security system and kill the power long enough for them to clean out the entire safe, all while wiping any camera footage that had may have caught them. Then again, Matt knew he could pull the stunt in his sleep. However, left inside the bank vault? ‘ _ мы единственные боги’  _ scrawled across the back wall of the vault in red paint, just as always. But there was something different about this particular tag, something that caught his eye right away. Right underneath the messily written phrase was a large, red cross.  Across the center of the cross was written in Russian,  _ В лучшем случае мы дьяволы. _

_ At best, we are only Devils. _

 

* * *

 

 

**November 12, 2008**

**12:47 a.m**

Things carried on normally for the hacker. He continued keeping close tabs on the syndicate that had risen to the top in LA, making careful note of their actions. Matt was a pretty well known hacker, and the biggest in the Los Angeles area. The newest syndicate was just as known, if not more. It was big and dangerous, home to many more bases than the average mafia and one of the largest illegal weapons trades and cartels in the states. If there's one thing that the redhead knew from working for years with Mello was that there's one key player in a mafia. An outside source, the man behind the screen; a hacker. If they were skilled enough, they could do anything. That is both incredibly useful, and also a horrifying gamble, especially for someone in a syndicate that large with so much to lose. No matter how powerful the mafia is, the hacker will always have the upper hand. Even though Mello wasn't the leader, he may as well have been. He'd used Matt as his hacker because Matt was trusted. Putting your entire syndicate in the hands of one computer genius was definitely questionable, which was why Matt knew that this new syndicate would reach out and contact the Ghost Hacker, eventually. His work spoke for itself, he always followed through without question. If the leader was smart, he'd seek out a reliable hacker, one with a reputation. One exactly like Matt. He prided himself in this, knowing damn well it was true. However, the contact was taking longer than he’d expected it would, and the crime rates revolvings around that Russian’s mafia was decreasing at an alarming rate, pausing for a month at a whole. Crime started popping up again, but none of the Russian tags were left behind. Matt knew better, though.

It was them, again. They’d done away with the tags, but the pattern was the same. A month prior when the syndicate was very active, their routine was pretty known, and not subtle in the slightest. A day before they would rob a building dry, the building would lose power for exactly four minutes and twelve seconds. When the robbery actually took place, the power would be knocked out exactly a minute before they went in. A pattern that seemed achingly familiar. That familiarity wasn’t the part that Matt was getting at, it was the fact that the new crimes taking place omitted the power outage the day before, and only caused the power to flicker twice an hour before. It was made to look like a copycat crime, but the redheaded hacker knew better than that. He’d worked for the mafia long enough to have figured the patterns out; he had an eye for them, and he’d gotten it from Mello. There was no doubt in his mind, this person knew Mello. Likely someone from another syndicate or some edgy teen that got loose from the house. Either way, this person looked up to Mello and admired his work from the previous mafia. He thought and worked like him, making it easy for Matt to think like him, as well. He knew Mello like his own mind, and this copycat made it depressingly easy for Matt to find him. He'd been hoping for more of a chase, but with this person having followed Mello so closely, he found it hard to have fun with it, though the waiting was rather irritating. Not to mention why the organization had seemed to suddenly drop off the face of the earth, that pissed him off, though slightly amused him. If they had been caught, that would easily mean that this leader was too reckless and too cocky. In the end, wasn't that was led to the explosion on Mello's last mission? Sighing, the redhead lowered his head, allowing the smoke to float up from his lips, hair hanging in his eyes. Out of habit, he reached up to his neck to play with the rosary, though a month had passed since he'd last even looked at it. 

Matt had taken it off after his conversation with Linda, and it remained where it was, out of sight but certainly not out of mind. Where it stayed on the wall in the shadows, Matt passed by it almost daily. He never looked at it, and took to ignoring its existence. He'd worn it long enough and each day he began to almost resent the weight around his neck. It was a painful thing, wearing that blood stained, melted and cracked piece of jewelry that Matt never understood the meaning of. He found it ironic, however, that the rosary held some sort of deep religious meaning for Mello, but Matt didn't believe in such deities. However, he wore the rosary in memory of the blond, and he was sure the necklace held more meaning to himself than it ever meant to Mello. To the hacker, it never mattered what sort of default meaning a rosary held for those who looked at them with understanding, the rosary held so much more meaning to Matt than that. But after so much time, he couldn't bring himself to put it back around his neck. He just couldn't wear it again.


End file.
